Dancing About Architecture

Desperately Seeking A Name

I have received an amazing amount of positive feedback about my thoughts of creating a blogging network for women. I am amazed that so many of you think that this is a fantastic idea. I initially want to begin this network as an email group to foster discussion about what you want to see in a blogging network, what features would be most useful to you and the best method of delivering it. I have found with forums and blogs that people forget to check them or feel a little intimidated to comment. However, with email it is in your face (well your inbox) and it is very easy to hit reply and type a response.

The main hurdle to getting all this up and running is coming up with a name for this new network. I want the network to be Australian based but open to everyone who wishes to join. Therefore, I thought of The International Women’s Bloggers’ Network, but that sounds really convoluted and clunky. Then I thought about cutting that down to just The Network, but that sounds like a secret underground Government organisation. Then I thought of a parody of the name of the TV show, Women’s Murder Club and having Women’s Blogger Club. However, none of these names are popping out at me and saying this is the perfect name!

Therefore, I am opening it up to you. What should this brand new group be called?

Edit: A friend of mine suggested Ning.com as a way to run the group.  What are people’s thoughts on Ning?  Is it a good way to go or are their limitations to it?

If you have liked what you have read, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Tags: blogging, female

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Overdosing on chocolate

I was so focused on getting my thoughts about creating a female blogger network down, that I completely forgot to talk about the Sydney Women’s Bloggers’ meetup and share some link love with those that attended.  I blame the massive amount of sugar I ingested.

There were five of us in attendance; Leigh from All for Women and Crazy Meezer, Christie from Fig & Cherry, Veronica from Kissing Fingertips and Fern from Not Nigella and Nappy Addicts.   We meet up at Max Brennar’s in Parramatta where all they serve is chocolate - lots and lots of chocolate.  We all had a hot chocolate and I indulged in a dark orange hot chocolate which was simply divine.  Then I made a fatal error and also got a chocolate souffle (pictured above, taken on my inadequate mobile phone camera).  It had dark, milk and white molten chocolate in the middle of it and sent my blood sugar levels off the chart.

Besides the amazingly sugar ladden food, we talk about blogging, photographing food (thanks for the tips Christie) and the insane crazy people that seem to populate forums.

We have already planned the next meetup which will a high tea so that we can pretend that we are refined women.  If you are interested in attending, let me know.

Tags: blogging, Chocolate, Sydney

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Using social networking tools to promote your blog

Most people when they start a blog simply set up their blog, write some posts and then wonder why no one is visiting or commenting.  They forget that one of the most important ingredients for running a successful blog is marketing.  Marketing, however, doesn’t mean spending money on advertising as there are many free methods you can use to promote your blog.  This article will be examining how to effectively use social networking tools to promote your blog.

Blogging can be quite a solitary process and it is very easy to become egotistical especially if you have tasted some success in the early days of your blogging journey.  In the blogging world though, people who engage with peers, create conversations and promote the work of others can easily gain credibility and traffic on their blogs.  On the other hand, those who just focus on their own blogs and use social networking tools purely for self promotion will quickly lose respect. Therefore using social networking tools to promote your blog needs to be done with care as once you lose respect and credibility, it is very hard to regain them.

The two social networking tools I am going to focus on are Twitter and StumbleUpon.  There are many other tools out there but these are the two I use most frequently and therefore feel somewhat qualified to talk about.

Twitter - either you love it or you hate it.  However, many bloggers do not know how to use it effectively to not only promote their own blogs but to build up connections with other bloggers. Using Twitterfeed to broadcast your latest blog posts is a great way to let those who are following you that you have written a new post, however, if that is all you use Twitter for then you are going to quickly lose followers and credibility. No one wants to read your twitter feed if all it is, is an RSS feed.  To use Twitter effectively, you must stop focusing solely on yourself and start connecting with others.  Tweet about articles you have read and enjoy and ask questions of your followers and use their knowledge to write future posts. There is nothing a fellow blogger likes more than to see themselves referenced in someone else’s blog.  Yes, all bloggers do contain a healthy dose of ego. Also use Twitter to follow bloggers that you admire and watch to see how they use it. See what they do that works and what doesn’t work. Learn from their mistakes and replicate their successes. Most bloggers who use Twitter will have their details on their blog and if not, it never hurts to ask them.No one is going to get upset at you because you want to hear more about them.

StumbleUpon is a social networking tool that really teaches you the value of giving. If you just use it to “stumble” or “like”  only your own posts then you won’t get much traffic from it.  However, if you use it to “stumble” or “like” other blogger’s posts then you will quickly gain the reputation as a Power Stumbler.  Power Stumblers can generate an amazing amount of traffic for the blogs that they stumble.  I can hear you all thinking, “well, what is in it for me?”.  This where connections really count.  Form a group of like-minded individuals and stumble each others posts. You give them the gift of great traffic and they in turn do the same for you.   It is a true win-win situation.  Of course, if you don’t like the post, don’t stumble it, you don’t want to get the reputation of stumbling any old crap.   If you are new to the blogging world and don’t really know anyone, still get out there and stumble.  If the blogger also uses StumbleUpon they can see exactly who has stumbled their post and will most likely go and check out your own blog and if they like what they see, they will stumble one of your posts. Well I know I do that so I am going to assume that other bloggers do as well.

Creating great content is useless if no one is going to read it.  You need to get out there and promote yourself and your work.  The best way to do that is by connecting with other bloggers especially those who blog in your own niche.  Social networking is an easy way to get yourself known, but you need to take care with the image you are portraying.  Just as in real life, bloggers feel favourably towards those who do things for them or take the time to get to know them.  Get out there and start connecting with your fellow bloggers, the rewards are greater than just an increase in your traffic.

Do you use social networking to promote your blog?  What tools do you use and what successes/failures have you had?  What do you find works best for you and what has been a waste of time?

Tags: advertising, blogging, promotion, social networking, stumbleupon, twitter

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Is it really that important to have a niche for your blog?

I have been doing a lot of reading over the past few weeks about ways to improve my blogging and increase my readership. Problogger and Blog Herald have both been invaluable in my quest for information about blogging and have some amazing articles which have given me much food for thought. However, the one issue that keeps turning up in almost every single article about blogging is the importance of picking a niche or topic. On the one hand this makes sense, pick a topic you are interested in and knowledgeable about and blog about that topic only. This way your readers will know what to expect when they come to your blog and won’t be confused by a myriad of topics. Then again, what if you are interested in a whole range of things but don’t feel knowledgeable or inspired enough to blog only about one of them?

I fall into this second category. I am interested in gay rights, but honestly, to blog about only about gay rights and gays issues would make me so depressed about the lack of rights GLBT people really have that I would end up in therapy. I also love social networking and Web 2.0, but there are so many people blogging on these issues who have so much more knowledge than I do, that I really can not compete with them. Instead I prefer to sit in awe of them and absorb their knowledge.

I decided to ask the amazing people on Plurk about their thoughts on how important it is to have a niche for your blog. Andrew from On Blogging Australia believes that the niche is over-rated by those of us who will never be professional bloggers, but then goes on to say that many successful bloggers do have niches. I then asked him that if you are not already famous in the blogosphere if you need to have a niche blog in order to become a successful blogger.

Eskimo_Sparky jumped in at this point and responded that he believes that in order to become a successful blogger, in terms of generating traffic to your site, it is more important to promote yourself and write good quality content than it is to have a niche. I like the way this man thinks as you can have a niche but if no one knows you are writing or if your content is crap then you are not going to be become a successful blogger anyway.

Leigh from All for Women and Crazy Meezer thought that finding a niche for the sake of finding a niche is just making it harder on yourself than blogging about what you are truly interested in. She has a very good point. Maybe when beginning blogging you should blog about what interests you initially and perhaps a niche will present itself from there. It could be something that you would have never initially considered.

Now I want to throw the debate open to all of you here. What are you feelings about having a niche for your blog? Do you have one? Did you, before you started blogging, decide to focus on a niche or did your niche evolve overtime? Or are you a believer in not having a niche at all?

Tags: blogging, niche blogging

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Inspiration Whilst Wasting A Precious Resource

In Australia, water is an extremely precious resource since we are plagued by drought and are living on a continent that is mainly desert. To try to save water we attempt to have very short showers. However lately I have found that I come up with my best blog ideas whilst in the shower. When struck with a good idea all efforts to quickly wash my hair and body go out the window as my mind is completely focused on fleshing out the idea. I stand under the trickle of the shower (damn water-saving shower head) and immerse myself in the idea. I have no idea why being wet and naked inspires me so.

I also come up with great ideas whilst on the bus to work which because I have nothing to record them with leak out of my head from the walk from Central Station to my office. I have just put a notebook and pen into my bag so I can jot them down.

Why I can hear you ask since you are self described geek do you not have a palm pilot or another geeky gadget to record your thoughts? The simple answer is that I can not afford one. However, if a company wants to send me one in return for a shiny review and intermittent product placements, I am all ears.

So where do you come up with your best blog ideas? Is it in the shower? The toilet? Lying in bed? Why do you think these places provide such inspiration?

Tags: blogging, Idea

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